


The Devil's Work (Is Never Done)

by SongsofSamael



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: ...I'll add more tags later because the Suspense(TM), Canon magic, Demons, M/M, Multi, how tf do you tag this has been so long, magic gone awry, relationships pending this is only the first chapter
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-13
Updated: 2017-03-13
Packaged: 2018-10-04 02:09:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10265111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SongsofSamael/pseuds/SongsofSamael
Summary: The theory is that the more magic you use to solve your problems, the more problems you create. Eliot Waugh puts that to the test as, in slight divergence, he tries to solve his own problems NOT just with alcohol alone. Stay tuned for the hellish results.





	

His second year of magic school, Eliot Waugh did something horrifically stupid.

This was not out of character for most Brakebills students, and was certainly not out of character for Eliot Waugh. The Indiana farmboy [though DON’T ever call him that; please, or it’d be more than an earful of corn handed to you—tried shoved directly up the rectum with zero beating around the bush] was often left to his own devices; as his off-putting demeanor [a mix between arrogance and foppishness that was ill-met by most]. Idle hands, and all that—

Except the actuality of a Devil had never seemed possible; and resting hands meant for the casting of spells and disruption of energies was much more probable to Eliot than fidgeting around equipment or wasting his time typing up essays.

No, the most Eliot allowed for fussing when it came to his hands [if not casting] was either pleasuring himself [or select lucky individuals #blessed enough to experience his particular form of physical engagement] or making drinks. He’d perfected the Bloody Mary using things he’d picked from the Nature Kids’ gardens; ingredients that left people laughing on the sofas of the cabin till they could scarcely breathe. It was positively Byronic; seeing the way they’d all sprawl out in a tableaux of decadence. His doing. It satisfied a deep hole in Eliot that inclined no joke [about deep holes and fulfillment or otherwise]. 

And yet, it never was quite enough to make him forget.

There were times when he’d wake in the dead of night, brain blistering with panic and shock over nightmares of a frightened and confused boy once on the sidewalk; then in the street, in view of a bus unable to throw on its brakes in time. It was the explosive anger of shattering mirrors in the wake of acne scars. It was the vibration like an earthquake under his skin at all times, threatening to shake him apart and wrest more than tears from him. It was pushing people away; literally shoving them off of him when they got too rough. It was throwing himself back when he got it wrong; as he sometimes did, blasting himself near to pieces and those around him beside. And if he couldn’t do this right, then what good was he, in the end? Did it matter? Did it matter that he’d killed; and, if he could not control it, kill again?

Telekinetics and guilt did not a friendly cocktail make. 

Which is why Eliot sought one day to set guilt aside and tackle his problems the way any student at Brakebills usually did—through magic.

Hours spent in libraries of humping books and rustling pages; giggling first-years and shushing librarians were torture. Classes dragged and the gradual simmer of a late Brooklyn Summer threatened to pull him back into memories of fields cooking in the sun—red necks and sun-beaten brows. Turnips. The very thought of Indiana brought bile to his throat that he forced back down with a flask of gin. He prowled shelves and traced spines with elegant fingers—digits he’d striven to the point of sacred sacrilege in keeping safe. 

He was looking for something to sever the guilt; the shade, as it were. Perhaps not his memories, per se. No, Eliot needed those to keep himself strong—to never go soft again [something he prided himself on in more ways than one]. Offers to go out and party with pixies were met with reluctant “no thanks…studying” lies that nobody seemed to believe. The only one who pursued it, however, was Margo—as she could always tell when something was up. Poker faces didn’t work on her—the woman was a shark who could smell a drop of blood in the ocean from a hundred meters off.

“You’re not yourself,” she pointed out to him sharply one day. Eliot glanced up from his mountain of books with a dull expression of indifference. Sea glass eyes shifted between Margo’s stubborn expression and the collective of literature, then back again. 

“What gave it away?” He asked finally; nonchalance and sarcasm oozing from every word. Margo tightened her jaw and reached for the book in his hands, closing it and setting it aside. Propping her arms on the stack nearest, she crouched a little [a true feat in killer magenta pumps capable of blinding a man in more ways than one] and watched him. 

“…talk to me.” Margo searched Eliot’s gaunt features for answers and got back only a blank stare; sunken eyes somewhat tired. “I’m only going to ask once.” Eliot almost caved, then—he usually did, around Margo—but knowing there was nothing she could do but tell him to stop whining [something he normally told himself], all he offered instead was a lofty lift of a shoulder.

“What would you like me to say?” He licked his lips and sat up a little, reaching to grab his book back. “I just haven’t been laid in a while?” Margo rolled her eyes and got back up, smoothing her striped skirt into place.

“Well—you know there’s ways of fixing that.” Eliot could tell she didn’t believe him. He couldn’t say he blamed her. “I’m off—I’m going to the ‘bake-off’--” she tossed air quotes like gang signs, with an expression of mild disgust, “at the Naturalists’ tonight. There’ll be edibles.” She reached into her purse and pulled out a tupperware with a knowing smile. “I’ve got you covered, Gloom and Doom. Although you could join me and solve your problems with one of those hippie boys.”

“Please,” said Eliot wryly, “reduce myself down to fucking a Neanderthal? Unlikely.” Margo snorted and tucked the Tupperware away again, heading for the door.

“Just—try not to brood too much, will you? It’s doing horrors for your complexion.” 

“I’ll affect a Dorian Grey outlook if I must,” Eliot called after her, then settled back against the couch to open the tome again.

There, in the center of the book, right where he’d left off, was his solution. Something that would eat his pain and leave the thoughts behind. Guilt would be shredded, inhibitions shed. 

Grinning his crooked grin to himself, Eliot swung long legs off the couch, tucked the book face-down onto the table, and set about to find what he needed to complete his mission.

* * *

Under the light of the full moon, feeling rather stupid now that all was said and done, Eliot paced in his room before settling cross-legged in the center of the circle of candles and chalk outlines [think less like murder and more like Full Metal Alchemist], reminding himself not to pick at the black lines of charcoal he’d smudged across his skin.

He was naked, which was bad enough, with the curtains open [worse], letting the moonlight and candlelight mingle over the inscriptions and drawings on the floor. He hoped the circle was even enough. The smell of rosewater and red wine was pungent in the air, an offering to an entity that, given his pseudo-careful consideration of texts, would seemingly come and go. A sin-eater, it was insinuated, had no business staying in a mortal realm for too long. Physicality hurt it, as its specialties lay more in nibbling the creased edges of souls. Things of mingling spaces; really—places spirits traveled when outside their corporeal shells. 

Bladiblahblahblah.

“Fuck this,” Eliot muttered, picking up a letter opener that would have to serve as the ‘ceremonial pointy instrument’, “I just want to clear my head and sleep through the night.” Pricking his index finger, Eliot winced and squeezed three drops of blood out over the circle’s center. “One, two, three, and…” Cupping his hands together, he set the knife aside and waited. 

And waited.

“Is this ever going to happen, or…?”

And waited.

Eventually, he ended up falling asleep. He must’ve. Because the next thing Eliot knew, he was waking up to something breathing in his ear.

He sat up sharply.

The candles had burned down to their ends, leaving only sad, melty piles of failure behind. The moonlight was higher than before, and didn’t seem to give much light to the room. His mouth was dry; and whatever had stirred him into awareness again seemed to have vanished.

That is, until he felt something press against his chest and slam him shoulders-first back into his floorboards.

Eliot opened his mouth to scream, but found the sound had been sucked out of him—either that or the pressure on his chest was too much for anything else. Blinking rapidly, he tried to find features of his assailant in the dark, but it took the thing ages to come into focus—

And when it did, it was right in front of his face.

And it was…ugly.

There were no other words for it.

It was blackish-gray; a head like a man’s skull, without eyes or mouth—just two slits for a nose, or something, and holes where ears ought to have been. Its weathered flesh scarred up around the eye-sockets, and the not-mouth was a mass of scar tissue built upon scar tissue. Long limbs with too many joints spidered around Eliot, two on his chest, two around his ribs. A sinuous thing encircled one of his ankles. Eliot, overwhelmed by terror, found his arms immobile. He tried to cast without moving; telekinetically attempting to shove the creature away. It didn’t budge, simply perched there. Breathing softly. 

It leaned in closer, and, without words, somehow said,

“Poor little you.”

Eliot stared at it.

“Poor little Eliot Waugh,” it said without saying, “looking for a way out.” One finger, long as his forearm, lifted from his chest to trace his cheek. The sensation was that of being stroked by fire. Eliot cringed, jerking his chin in a vain attempt to get away. “Looking…for me.” The finger forced its way into his mouth and Eliot nearly choked, one leg managing to free itself from the hideous weight of the Thing. He tried to knee it and found it barely moved. The finger, however, blessedly left his mouth. Eliot found he could speak.

“What the FUCK are you--?!”

“You called me here.” The Thing tilted its head to one side, neck sliding out of place, shifting grotesquely like a chord of rope. “Do you not know my name?” Eliot swallowed, trying to think of what came next in the spell.

“I—I did, yes, I know you, I-I—I wanted to…to ask you…to—to take it. Take it away, the…” He blanched as the Thing’s head dipped closer, slitted nostrils flaring.

“That’s not what you want,” it said.

“…What do you mean that’s not--!”

“I tasted it.” It seemed to smile without smiling. “The gift you left me. Blood tells more than tongues do, child.” Eliot’s skin crawled as the long fingers splayed across his ribs, scraping dull nails. “Guilt doesn’t bother you. Failure is what bothers you; failure and lonelinessss.” Its last words were a hissing sigh. Eliot felt the nails dig in, and bucked to no avail. 

“You never have to be alone, now, Eliot.” There was a sudden, searing pain unlike anything Eliot had ever felt before. It burst in his ribcage like fire; spiraling outwards like sparks. His bones were tinder, going up in flames. He tried to scream and found the sound was gone. His lungs were collapsing in a chasm of smoke, and he was burning up from the inside out. He could feel the pressure building, rising like ash. Strangely, this feeling was offset by a sweet and rising pleasure, the cinders in his veins intertwining with butterflies. Little by little, the creature seemed to be sinking into him. It molded its art-clay body to his, spreading out across his frame like oil. Eliot weakly grasped at it, trying to pull the Thing from his flesh, but the more he did so, the more he found himself tearing at his own frame.

“You have me,” the Thing whispered sweetly in his ear. Eliot gasped as the last of the demon sank into his body, and, free of it all, burst into a telekinetic frenzy that lifted him off the floor and shattered every window in the Physical Kids’ Cabin—

Before his world went black with a sickening thud, his head colliding with the chalk-lined mahogany floor.

**Author's Note:**

> Jeepers creepers, it's been a while. I have only just begun watching season two. Apologies for my absence - with how season one ended, it took me a while to get back into it. But I came back for the characters, and here I am, still loving Eliot Waugh just a bit too much. Please enjoy!


End file.
